


Pain

by graysonsflight



Category: DCU, Young Justice
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-08
Updated: 2013-08-08
Packaged: 2017-12-22 19:08:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/916958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/graysonsflight/pseuds/graysonsflight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They did it for the pain.  Both of them had known so much of it, they could hardly function without it.  He would come home, bruised and bloody, a still warm gun burning against his thigh, and there she’d be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pain

**Author's Note:**

> They’ve found one dead hero, brought back to life, or something like it - and one who’s been dead inside for years.

They did it for the pain.  Both of them had known so much of it, they could hardly function without it.  He would come home, bruised and bloody, a still warm gun burning against his thigh, and there she’d be.

            She would cut her hair, over and over again, until it was ragged, short, but just long enough for him to run his fingers though; yank it hard, pull too tight, and she loved every second of it.

            It was never sweet, or slow, soft or loving.  She refused to kiss him on the lips.  It was hard and rough, and she rarely, if ever, let him coax her into the bed.  She preferred it up against the wall, the door, the cold counter tops.

            The one night he’d tried to be sweet, brush her just long enough hair behind her ear, she’d pulled a knife.  With the flat of the blade resting against his Adam’s Apple, she had dared him to do it again.  After that night, she hadn’t shown up at his door for a week.  Just when he’d thought that maybe, maybe they were done – and she would go back to her nice little friends and the memory of her dead boyfriend – she showed back up on his front door, her knuckles cracked and bleeding.  He didn’t ask any question, just pulled her inside, and dropped to his knees in front of her – treating her like a goddess; Goddess of the hunt – of the wild – but never, never the Goddess of Chastity.  How could she be when she purred his name?  When she remembered to say not to say _his name,_ of course.

            She knew he craved the pain.  She knew it helped to anchor him to this world – just as it did her.  She knew she could make him beg when her nails carved tempting half-moons into his flesh.  And she was grateful.  So grateful that he never asked that dreaded question, “How are you?” because he always all ready knew the answer: She hurt.  She hurt in a way she couldn’t explain, hurt so deeply from a place inside of her that she couldn’t point it out.  The pain must have come from some where in the vicinity of her heart – of her soul – of that lightening bolt shaped hole inside of her.

            And in return, she never asked him how he felt; how the memories were doing as they burned across his mind.  Pictures, snap-shots of a life only half lived – of disappointment and fear.  While she wouldn’t kiss his mouth – she tried to kiss everywhere else, willing his pain away.

            No one knew, they were sure.  Because if any of them did, they would “be concerned.”  Worried that one or the other wasn’t good enough – was too broken – wouldn’t help in the “healing process.”  But what the others thought, or did, or said, didn’t matter.  It didn’t matter that so many of them were dealing with their own private hells – because in the time the two for them were together – they could both forget what it was like to be cold, scared and alone.  They could give into the pain – share it, bask it in.  Just enough, just enough physical contact to fill the voids left inside of them.  Just enough, not to give in, enough to keep going, if only until the next time.


End file.
